Page 8 of Kiwi Sin
“Yes,” she said.“Despitemy worry, due to my husband deciding to assume I didn’t love him enoughtoworry.” She was smiling, though. “You’re off the hook this time, but watch it, mister. Don’tscareme like that.”
He laughed, then said, “Let’s go, Gabriel. We’ll get your kit off and have a look. Some Panadol probably wouldn’t come amiss, either. I’m guessing there’s no drinking at Mount Zion. Pity. I’d say a beer or two, otherwise.”
“Pardon?” I was starting to get a bit shaky again.
“Into the house,” he said, his demeanor changing completely. “Need an arm to lean on?”
“No,” I said, and then tried to make that be true.
A man was meant to be stoic and strong and in control of the situation. Unfortunately, none of that appeared to be happening.
Maybe tomorrow.
4
FISH OUT OF WATER
Gabriel
I’d known leaving would be a challenge. I just hadn’t realized how muchof a challenge.
That first night, I ate dinner with the family, telling myself,They’re notyourfamily. You live alone now,and went downstairs afterward. Ten minutes later, I was standing at a severely rectangular porcelain sink set into about a hectare of creamy stone benchtop and surrounded by more mirrors than I’d ever seen in my life, sponging myself off as best I could in an enormous bathroom that was just for one person. The shower would hurt too much on my back, was the reason for the sponging, not that I didn’t know how to turn on a tap. I knew how to use a shower!
The “granny flat,” it turned out, wasn’t a granny anything. It was another whole house that I had all to myself, stuck onto the back of the series of cubes, with a separate bathroom that was all shiny surfaces and not a bit of concrete, containing an endless number of drawers that would hold … what?
A razor and toothbrush, toothpaste and soap. Drew had found extras for me, and they’d about doubled my list of possessions. What else did people find to put in those drawers? What could there possibly be? I couldn’t even imagine. Besides that, there was a stacked washer and dryer in here—at least, I assumed that was what they were—that werealsojust for one person, plus enough towels for a crew, both big and small versions, all of them about four times as thick and fluffy as any towel I’d ever seen. They were also resolutely, pristinely white, as if they’d never been used before. I used one of the little towels to dry off, trying not to dirty anything more than I had to, then walked through the kitchen, full of more mysterious appliances I had no clue how to use, and dressed in another of Drew’s T-shirts and a pair of his undies, because I had nothing else to wear. I had no pajamas on, which was unthinkably immodest, but there was nobody here to see, so I guessed that was OK.
Not to mention that the undies themselves were shocking. They were short on the legs, low on the hips, and tight, so you could see all of me through them. I barelyfitin them. They were also red. Drew had given me another pair, too, that were bright yellow and had palm trees and monkeys printed all over them. Both pairs had still been in their pack, and he'd said, “Don’t laugh. Hannah bought them. Forwards wear black, I told her. Black boots, and black undies. If she wanted a man who wears red undies, reckon she should’ve picked somebody else.”
He'd said it in front of her. That was the worst. I’d struggled for something to say and finally come up with, “Thanks,” and Hannah had laughed and said, “It was worth a try. You’ve got that body, Drew, and you won’t even decorate it this much for me? I’m a woman of few pleasures.”
“Oh?” he’d said. “Sounds like I’ve got work to do, then.” I didn’t want to know what that meant.
The undieswereimmodest, then, which was a relief to know. Even though I was wearing them.
Hannah had put a loaf of bread, a stick of butter, a jar of jam, and a carton of milk into the fridge when she’d brought me down here. She’d also handed me a packet of tea, which was good, then given me a dozen eggs in a carton and told me, “We’ll take you shopping tomorrow, but you’ll need these to fuel you up for it, I’m guessing.”
“I can’t come and help,” Jack had said, sounding disappointed. “Grace and I have school. Only Madeleine can go. It’s a pity, because I’m good at shopping. I know where everything is. Usually, Mum and Dad give me some of the list, so it goes faster.” All the kids had come down here with us, which made the place feel friendlier, not so shiny and empty.
“You are,” Hannah said, resting a hand on Jack’s head for a moment in a way that was, again, a little less alien. Also, having the kids here meant I wasn’t alone with a woman. With somebody’swife.“Gabriel’s going to be staying with us, so you’ll have heaps of chances to help him.”
“Only until I get my feet under me,” I said. “It’s very kind of you.”
“It’s nothing,” she said. “Anybody would do the same.” Which wasn’t what I’d heard about Outside, but so far, nothing was.
I told myself that the pain from the burns would be better tomorrow, that I was just tired, and it would all get easier, and eventually tried to go to sleep on my stomach in an impossibly wide bed that should have held four or five kids, with the silence pressing on my ears and too much empty space around me. Totally exhausted, even though I’d worked not a bit today, and absolutely restless at the same time, as if my body was expecting to have to leap up again at any moment.
I tried to sleep, but I couldn’t. I hurt, and my thoughts were too big and too dark. I got up again and went into the lounge.
A big black glass screen sat on a low cabinet. That would be a TV. Hannah had held up two separate box-type things full of buttons to be pushed and said, “This remote to turn it on and off and for the volume, and the other one’s for Sky,” and I’d thought,What?
So far, I was safe from the corrupting influence of television, because the only thing I managed to do was turn the thing on. After that, I pushed buttons and ended up with a fuzzy gray-and-black screen that I couldn’t make go away, so I abandoned it for another day.
There were some books on a shelf near the TV—novels, I thought, because they seemed to be stories. I hadn’t read many novels, and no worldly ones, but reading was one thing Ididknow how to do, so I took a look.
Most of them had names like “Final Notice” and “Red Dawn” and “The Hot Zone,” and seemed to be, from the pictures on the covers and the first pages, about things exploding and people shooting each other. I’d had my fill of things exploding today, so I picked up a thinner book whose cover pictured a woman wearing jeans and boots. She was standing with her hip cocked and a thumb in her belt like a man, and the title was,Arrest Me, Officer.It looked like it might be funny, and possibly illustrative of actual real life Outside, beyond the wars and such. Homework, you could say.
I carried the book back to the bedroom, turned on the light that sat on the little table beside the bed, because you were apparently meant to lie about lazily here and would need light for it, lay on my stomach—yes, lazily—in my red undies, and started reading.
